Carmen

Georges Bizet’s music for Carmen is so astonishingly melodic that when it’s conducted and sung well, nothing can be done to dim its lustrous beauty. Fortunately, that degree of care runs through Richard Eyre’s new production at the Metropolitan Opera, even though the result is surprisingly bloodless.

Under the guidance of conductor Yannick Nezet-Seguin, Latvian mezzo-soprano Elina Garanca as Carmen and Roberto Alagna as Don Jose made the sort of sounds (including notable diction) that audiences hope to hear and are often willing to settle for.

However, seasoned operagoers who expect the kind of torrid connection between the work’s lovers that threatens to set the stage on fire came away after the tragic fourth act feeling deprived. The chemistry was a non-event between Garanca — who sang the “Habanera,” the “Seguidilla” and, especially, the card scene with darkly robust energy — and Alagna (who had the ill fortune to crack twice at the end of an otherwise exquisite “La fleur que tu’ m’avais jetee.”)

Shared passion is so lacking here that it seems as if Eyre wants the story to be taken as a cynical one-sided romance in which Don Jose loses himself, body and mother-devoted soul, to Carmen while she thinks of him as nothing more than as a pawn who’s heart she can have fun tormenting until something better comes along. When this Carmen exclaims “Prends garde” (“be warned”), she sure-as-shootin’ means it. Granted, the approach isn’t entirely invalid, but it’s not what has kept the opera extraordinarily popular for 135 years.

Interestingly, it’s possible that Eyre foresaw the trouble a mismatched Carmen and Don Jose might present, for he invited Christopher Wheeldon to choreograph short ballets preceding the first and third acts. In them, New York City Ballet principal dancer Maria Kowroski and former Royal Ballet first soloist Martin Harvey suggest a surrogate Carmen and Don Jose as they braid their supple bodies together with the libidinous abandon missing from the main action.

Because this is Carmen, there are other times when bursts of dynamism insistently jolt the proceeding. Mariusz Kwiecien, who’s Manolete-slim as Escamillo, continually puts his baritone to good use. The second-act quintet, which does benefit from a lickety-split tempo, is a sensation, although Eyre muddies its finish with stage business. Chorus master Donald Palumbo does his usual expert job with his singers, particularly the excitedly chirping children.

Also noteworthy is the show curtain by set and costume designer Rob Howell, in which a flash of red lightning cracks a wall of blackness. Then in the fourth act, Howell slyly garbs the doomed Carmen in a black dress with a slash of red ribbon down it that not only echoes the show curtain but also conjures a trail of shed blood. No detailed mention will be made of Eyre’s final image, except to say it’s revealed when the set consisting of ruined arenas revolves one last turn. The surprise tableau is crude and unnecessary.